As always excellent graphics, the soundtrack was a little lackluster but by no means bad. Game play was more or less what we’ve come to expect but with some excellent set pieces thrown in to spice things up. Maybe the designers could improve things by making the next entry in the series (due out tomorrow) a little longer.
8/10.
I used to have a 6×4 foot poster of the image below. It was in my bedroom,then it was in our sitting room in the second year at university.
The group spent a small fortune creating the thing out of copper, zinc and magnets, all carefully machined, as well as a dining room table. At the end of nine months, Spear and the “New Mary,” an unnamed woman, went through a bizarre ritual that mimicked giving birth and the God Machine supposedly came to life. Unfortunately, it didn’t do much (some observers said nothing at all) and Spear allegedly moved the thing to Randolph, New York where it was smashed to bits by angry farmers. No known image of the “New Messiah” exists, but several illustrator have been made based on descriptions of the machine.
Also it was a band who recorded this song (right click > “save as”. You know that right?). It’s a shame the album’s not widely available, my copy really is on it’s last legs.
I’ve been meaning to write something about the Brit Box, a compilation of NME/Melody maker bands 1984-1999, that seems to be exciting certain sections of the indie-blogosphere. Luckily Simon Reynolds already summed up my feelings pretty well.
Racists in Britain used to chant “There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack.” Draping themselves in this flag, Britpop artists inadvertently sealed themselves off from the invigorating stream of new ideas coming from black music in the ’80s and ’90s, a good proportion of them — genres like jungle and 2step — spawned on Britpop’s own doorstep. Cultivating their quintessential quaintness, clinging tight to a glorious and storied past, the British groups instead concentrated on appealing to patriots at home and Anglophiles abroad. But in the process they lost the world.
The images above are covers from the comic Phonogram which, as a glance will probably tell you, has quite a lot of interesting stuff to say about Brit Pop as well as some slightly less interesting stuff to say about the author’s fantasy life.
“Geometry of Circles” is a series of unnumbered animation pieces created for Sesame Street in 1979 with music by Philip Glass.
The shorts consist of the movement of six circles that are formed by and split up into various geometric patterns. Glass’s music underscores the animation in a style that closely resembles the “Dance” numbers and the North Star vignettes written during the same time period as his Einstein on the Beach opera.
Very, that’s how. I bet Cbeebies isn’t commissioning any avant-garde composers to produce kind-of-scary geometry animation soundtracks for them. Which is a shame, I used to live for the animations in Sesame Street.
What will they make of that thin strata in the soil around major cities comprised entirely of free AOL CDs? For a few years I must have recieved one or two a week through various mechanisms, magazine inserts, the royal mail etc. Not one of which was ever inserted in a CD drive. The closest one got was a microwave.
In the real world, we don’t articulate our social networks. Imagine how creepy it would be to wander into a co-worker’s cubicle and discover the wall covered with tiny photos of everyone in the office, ranked by “friend” and “foe,” with the top eight friends elevated to a small shrine decorated with Post-It roses and hearts.
So Electrelane played their last gig over the weekend. I saw their penultimate performance last Thursday at Koko in Camden along with Alex and various others.
I’ve seen them perhaps 5 or 6 times over the past 5 or so years and this was amongst their best shows, they played all the hits plus a load of stuff from the new record which I’d not heard live before but really was their best stuff. It’s a shame they’re going but at least they’re leaving ahead of the pack and on their own terms.
Here’s a picture of them at Koko.
They didn’t really look so far away.
My favourite Electrelane shows have all been at small venues, they’re not the most talkative of performers but they really respond to the audience in more intimate surroundings. The Scala was the worst place I saw them, it had it’s normal crypt like chilling effect on any connection between band and fans. I refuse to see anyone there these days having seen all my fave bands play disappointing sets there. The highlight for me remains their two shows at the Luminaire in May 2006, the mini residency in the tiny venue giving them freedom to really stretch out their krautrock side.
Here’s a picture of them at the Luminaire.
The Luminaire really is the best place in London to see bands, and I’m not just saying that because it’s walking distance from my flat. Though that does have something to do with it.
Anyway, back to last Thursday: The last song they played (probably at their last gig too, I should imagine) was a Bruce Springsteen cover it’s the song that, as a B-side of an early single, first made me pay attention to them and it seemed like the most appropriate way for them to leave.
